Small War on Basilan (catch all)

[Dayuhan]

You hit upon an important element of social change, first there must be a shift in what is accepted as conventional wisdom, and once that shift takes place, structural changes will adapt to the new conventonal wisdom. Bob's repeated reference to our Civil Rights Movement is a great example.

I'm not convinced that corruption and prejudice towards Filipino Muslims is as indelible as you assume. The same opinions offered about racism in the U.S. in the 60s would have sounded like wise counsel, but in hindsight it apparent changes in popular social values are possible, as they have been throughout history. It is a human trait to assume that perceived reality today will be the same tomorrow.

I wouldn't say prejudice toward Philippine Muslims is necessarily indelible, but it's deeply entrenched and I see no sign at all that it's changing. If anything it looks like it's getting worse. It's really quite striking, and it prevails even among many who on other issues seem quite progressive. I don't think it can't change, but I don't see that it's changing.

Corruption is another story. It's a major issue and there's a lot of resentment, but the focus is invariably on national-level corruption. That's partly because the media are Manila-centric, and partly because it's safer. Political violence in the Philippines is overwhelmingly on the local level. Media can run all the exposes they want and complain all they want about national politicians, but those who do the same at the local level often encounter bullets. These killings are almost never solved and they are generally ignored by police, who know perfectly well what's going on.

I think you’re correct that we can’t accomplish much more with our advise and assist mission, but before one simply pulls the plug they really need to assess the risks at multiple levels, and none of those levels has anything to do with AQ, but rather regional stability, economic, social and political repercussions, and another failed mission because we failed to focus our efforts on the right focus areas. Of course if the conflict elevates into a major slug fest again with high casualties and massive IDP flows it will create an opportunity for regional extremists to leverage.

All true, but again I don't think "we" have much of a role to play.

We all want to run to the sounds of the gunfire, but as you have stated previously the real problem is in Manila, and if the USG isn’t working with the Filipinos (not just the government, but whole of society) to help negotiate solutions we’re not going to accomplish anything enduring. Our approach shouldn’t be one of war (in this situation), but rather an approach to achieving peace using all the hard lessons learned by the West and the UN in tens of peace operations around the world. That would be an entirely different approach than the one being pursued now, although a peace settlement is being discussed on the side. The Peace Effort should be the main effort and all efforts supporting. That wouldn’t prevent the security forces from going after terrorists, but it would put the operation in a different context.

We actually tried throwing pressure behind a "peace agreement", with USIP taking the lead role and substantial if fairly quiet pressure on the diplomatic level. That turned out to be an unmitigated disaster. The agreement was fatally flawed from the start - I recall nominating it for a "peace agreement least likely to produce peace" award - and was inevitably shot down. The US pressure was deeply resented by much of the populace and gave rise to all sorts of bizarre rumours that the US had cut a deal with the MILF to back the agreement in exchange for economic concessions and base rights. Nothing was accomplished and a fair bit of damage was done.

A whole of society approach is something that we have given lip service to, but rarely pursued it as seriously as I think we should have. In the Philippines we have already seen the power of using text messaging as a means to mobilize the populace to oust powerful actors. Could it be that most people are good, but don’t know how act good, or have little hope that one voice will be able to make a change; however, if they sense the potential to make real change they’re much more apt to act?

The younger Filipinos who are being exposed to new ideas due to the information revolution will be able to start a new national social consciousness that will take time to shatter the old, but the U.S. could help with this (primarily with information), and I argue in some cases should help. We’re not advocating a violent uprising, but a new conversation that challenges the old paradigms.

Information technology, social media etc can spread hate and prejudice as easily as expanded consciousness. Much of the world (including much of the US) uses the internet for affirmation, not information; they construct closed networks of sites and individuals who tell them what they want to hear and feed their prejudices. Again, I agree that it's possible that change will happen, but it's also possible that it won't, or that the mutual antipathy could get worse... and either way, I don't think anything the US does is going to help, and doing the wrong thing could easily hurt.

Peace Groups (NGOs) are already facilitating discussions between Muslim youth in the south and Christian youth in the north. These discussions if not overly controlled will allow for some frank discussions and help shatter misperceptions and create a demand for justice over time.

This is not a bad thing, but it's not a new thing either. I hope it works, but I've little optimism, based on observation of both sides.

When one works in the developing world for years on end it is easy to get jaded (based on realistic assessments), but we can’t afford to give up all hope. If we do, then I agree why we even try to help.

There's a difference between losing hope and understanding that not everything is about us and there are often limited possibilities for us to act productively. There may be times when we can be useful, but they're few and far between and opportunities have to be taken with a great deal of subtlety and a lot more understanding of the situation than we've demonstrated so far. A clumsy and ill advised effort to help is likely to do more harm than doing nothing at all.